The Word of the Day

Is "exhausted". I feel like I've been either in an airport or on a plane for 48 hours. I got home at a little after 8 pm last night, ate some dinner, drank a couple of glasses of wine and was asleep at around 9:30. It was pretty much "Hi Honey! I'm getting drunk and passing out! I've missed you too! Zzzzzz...."

I hope it was good for him too.

The trip was great, the meeting was actually interesting, and I had a lot of fun getting to know my co-worker and her baby better. And if I thought I wanted a baby before, I definitely want one now. She charmed everyone and was delightful the whole time. And adorable. Of course, adorable.

On a completely unrelated subject (since I'm exhausted and my attention span is suffering because of that), have you been watching Top Chef this season? The finale is tonight. I have no idea who is going to win the competition, but I think I'm firmly on the Ilan side of things as for who I want to win. Should be interesting, especially if I can stay up long enough to watch it. I may have to have caffeine for dinner so that I can make that happen.

And....on to topic #3. So yeah, I was in Minnesota, in January, and it was as cold as you would think it would be. 2 degrees with a wind chill that was definitely below zero. It was a beautiful clear day and the sun was shining, but I think that's what made it colder - when there's no cloud layer to keep the heat in, the heat all just leaves. And hey, at least now I know what to expect in a couple of days weather-wise.

I'm supposed to be working...

but instead I'm uploading some photos.

We had a big bag of undeveloped film that we decided to take in this week. There were pictures from early in our relationship, pictures from before we even knew each other (and we've been together since the beginning of 2001), and other pictures that I knew were in there, but wasn't sure I wanted to see.

I know I've written about my car accident on this site numerous times. Now I finally have the pictures to back up my story. This is my car, post-running into the back of a much bigger truck.


The bumper is tucked under the hood, apparently for safe traveling. You can see exactly where I hit the guy's hitch and it pushed back.


Let this be a lesson to you - as ridiculous as it sounds, people do sometimes stop on freeway on-ramps. I was looking to see if I could merge onto the freeway when the car two ahead of me slammed on its brakes. Then the guy in front of me slammed on his brakes. Since I was looking out my side window I didn't see this and plowed right into him going about 40 or 50 miles an hour. Not fun. The only thing that happened to his truck was that it had pieces of my car in its bed.

Aaron was a little miffed at me for wrecking the car before he saw it. He thought it was just a little fender bender. When he saw it he wasn't mad anymore. He also realized why everyone who was at the scene kept asking me if I was sure I was okay. I didn't even get whiplash, I think because I didn't see it coming so I didn't have a chance to tense up. I did have a bruise from the seatbelt across my shoulder, but that's it. I was lucky.

And now for something a little less stressful (for me at least); a couple days ago when I wrote my proposal story I got a couple of requests for a picture of my engagement ring, so here it is:

It's aquamarine. I wanted something a little different than the "normal" engagement ring, and we had fallen in love with a similar ring when we were on vacation once. Unfortunately the similar ring was a blue diamond and cost about $25,000; a little out of our price range to say the least. This is just as pretty, in my opinion. It's a little big now so I don't wear it as much because I'm completely paranoid and terrified about losing it.

I'm going to be on a business trip in Minnesota on Monday and Tuesday. I'm not looking forward to it for some reason. Could it be the cold? Probably. It's probably also about being away from Aaron for a night (yes I'm sappy, and I'm okay about that), the plane ride (I'm not a big fan), and a boring 5 hour meeting. Although my co-worker is bringing her baby and I'm really excited about that. She asked if I minded that the baby was coming with us. My reply was, "There's a chance I might get to hold the baby. I don't mind at all."

Weekend Plans (are sometimes not exciting at all)

The end of January has snuck up on me, and I am suddenly even more busy at work, even (probably, unfortunately) having to work over the weekend. My least favorite. Then I have to hop a flight on Monday to Minnesota and I'll be there for just a skotch under 24 hours.

Other than that my weekend plans include laundry, cleaning house, grocery shopping, making mint chocolate chip ice cream, maybe having some friends over to eat said ice cream because I promised I would, and probably some crocheting. I'll definitely be avoiding the outdoors because it's cold here. Not like it's not cold elsewhere, but it actually hurts my skin to be outdoors today. It's no fun at all. Hibernation seems like the best way to spend the weekend. It's really that cold.

You wish you were me, don't you?

So, I need to live vicariously through all of you. To steal an idea from Linda over at All & Sundry, what are you doing this weekend? I want to hear all about it.

A Proposal Story

Three years ago today at about 11:30 pm, Aaron knelt down on my favorite pair of jeans and asked me to marry him. What, you want more of a story than that? Okay, here's the long version:

A little over three years ago, I found the engagement ring I wanted. I was out shopping by myself, and saw it. It fit perfectly, which I took as an omen, so I got the number on the tag of the ring and slipped it to Aaron when I got home. He and I had talked for a long time about getting married, but he wanted to wait a little bit longer to propose. Until he had a better job, he said, and he had a little bit of money saved up.

A couple of weeks later we were out shopping together for Christmas gifts, when we passed the store where I had found my ring. I dragged him in there to show him, but it was gone. I was completely bummed, and he was too. We talked about getting engaged a little more and he said it would probably happen around March, because he'd been working on saving up some money to buy a ring, and he figured he'd have enough saved by then.

Fast forward to this date in 2004. Aaron and I were set to go to our friends' house to help them stuff their wedding invitations, and then go to a play after that. As we were leaving our house, I asked if I could tell people there that he was my fiance, since technically we knew we were getting married, it just wasn't "official" yet. He said no, not today.

So we went, we stuffed envelopes, and we went to the play. We walked out of the theatre doors after the play was over and were met by temperatures below zero. It was FREEZING, to say the least. Aaron looked disappointed for some reason, and I couldn't figure out what was wrong. He wouldn't tell me, either, so I didn't press it. He was quiet the whole way home (about a 90 minute drive), while I was chattering away, oblivious to his major scheme.

Once we got home, I was exhausted. It was way past my bedtime, and I had had a couple of glasses of wine, so I had to hit the bathroom first thing after we walked in the door. While I was headed there, Aaron shouted after me, "Where are you going?"

"I have to pee!" I replied over my shoulder as I ran to the closest bathroom.

After I was done there, and since I was really very tired, I decided to head up to bed.

"Where are you going now?" Aaron asked.

"To bed. It's late, and I have to work in the morning."

He seemed distressed, but frankly, at that moment I felt too tired to care very much. He followed me up the stairs. I went into the bedroom which was strewn with a couple of discarded outfits I had tried on but decided against earlier in the day. As I was taking off my earrings, he knelt down on the floor next to me, right on top of my favorite pair of jeans which I had carelessly left there.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"Jessie, I love you. Will you marry me?"

Then he opened up a ring box that contained the very ring I thought had been purchased by someone else. He had it all along. Sneaky guy!

"Are you kidding me?" was my response. Mostly because he was such a sneaky guy, and I couldn't believe he had the ring.

Then I kissed him.

"Not exactly the response I was looking for," he said, looking at me like he was expecting something more.

"OF COURSE I'LL MARRY YOU!" I cried, while literally crying.

And that's how my wonderful husband proposed to me.

He wanted to propose on the stairs in front of the theatre but figured it was too cold, and that's why he looked disappointed on the way home. I truly had no idea what he had planned for that night. He always claims that I ruin his surprises, which I often do, but that day he completely surprised me and I'm so glad he did.

On to the next one...

Yesterday's post was kind of, well, heavy. Sorry for that. So let's focus on something different, since I'm not nearly as blue as I implied yesterday. In fact I'm in a great mood today, and I have no idea why. Could it be the chocolate cake I made last night? Possibly.

Last night on the way home from the gym (early because I was mad due to every cardio machine being in use for over 40 minutes...grrr...) I was trying to decide what I wanted to eat for dinner. The only thing that kept popping into my head was chocolate, specifically, the recipe I had seen over the weekend for Emergency Chocolate Cake (the recipe is at that link, but the cooking temperature is 350 degrees, not 30 as that site lists). I mixed it while our dinner was cooking, threw it in the oven, and it was done just in time for our dinner to have settled enough so we had room for the cake. It was very light and fluffy, only slightly chocolatey, but delicious warm with some whipped cream on top. The chocolate craving was definitely an emergency last night and this cake fit the bill.
**************************************************************************
Scenes from this morning:

Scene 1
Setting: kitchen
Me: You know what tomorrow is, right?
Him: Hmmm *thinks for a minute* Oh! 2 years...
Me: 3
Him: 3 years since the day I proposed!
Me: Right! Is that why you wanted to go out to dinner tomorrow night?
Him: No
Me: *sending telepathic waves that he could lie about it, look good for remembering, and totally get away with it*
Him: Yes! Of course! That's why!

Scene 2
Setting: Bathroom, getting ready for the day.
Me: Yesterday morning I couldn't find my brown heels that I had worn the day before, and I looked all over for them, but finally decided that I must have left them at the gym. So, when I got to the gym I checked the lost and found and they didn't have them, and then I looked in the locker where I thought I left them, and they weren't there, so I was bummed. But then I figured, yeah, I'm bummed, but they're just shoes right? I'll get over it. So then I unpacked my gym bag and there they were at the bottom of the bag. I felt like such an idiot!
Him: At least you felt like what you were.
Me: Hey!
Him: *walks away chuckling to himself*
Me: *plotting a way to get him back later, because payback is a bitch, man*

Something Different

The past few weeks have flown by and I even commented once "It's Friday already?" This week is not the same. It feels like a Thursday, but unfortunately it's not. Dealing with insomnia is definitely not making the week go by any faster either.

It's cold and grey here, and I've been thinking a lot about last winter. Last winter, when I didn't sleep for two months. Last winter, when my ear issues were new and frustrating, and I felt hopeless. Last winter, when I had to take days off of work because I couldn't bring myself to get out of bed, not because I was tired, but simply because I didn't have the will to do so. Last winter, when there were dark thoughts that scared my husband when they finally came to the surface. Last winter, when certain medications started looking like the best option instead of the last resort.

Last March was the hardest month I've ever lived through, and frankly, last April I was surprised that I had. In April I told my husband that he'd better get me pregnant by this time next year so that maybe having something else to concentrate on would keep me out of my yearly winter funk that had been way more than a funk last year.

Well, we aren't pregnant, but we are doing some things that I'm hoping will make this late winter something different than last, because I'm petrified of being that way again. This winter I'm taking a class for work. An online class, but a class all the same, and hopefully a good distraction. We're also going to Florida for a week and a half, the same week and a half that I almost didn't make it through just a year ago. I'm hoping some sunshine and warmth will be the best medicine.

I'm incredibly excited for this trip, mostly because I've never been to Florida, and I'm looking forward to a long break from the daily grind. But I'm also excited because I think it will help get me out of that dark place if I start to go there again. Last year the beginning of the end of the mega-funk was a trip to the beach, albeit a cold beach along the shore of Lake Michigan, but it was a sunny day and I felt a little hopeful again. I haven't felt the funk coming on yet, but the grey days have just begun and I'm scared.

Double the Pain

I had to change the channel after about 45 minutes of American Idol the other night because it was just too painful to watch. I can't handle watching people doing something that, if not embarrassing to them, is definitely embarrassing to me. It was the Seattle night, and there were those two friends who definitely weren't going to Hollywood - the little guy with the huge eyes who thought he was a member of N'Sync, and his more rotund, Hawaiian-shirt-wearing friend. They were both painful to watch, and then Simon made it worse by making fun of the way they looked.

This has become a big deal apparently. Yes, I agree with many, that this is a singing competition, and that if Simon didn't have anything nice to say about other aspects (no matter their importance) he shouldn't have said anything at all.

Well, those two friends were just on the Today show this morning, and it was painful and embarrassing all over again. Good public speakers, they are not. Definitely not. I had to mute it because I was cringing so much. I can understand (maybe) starting a dialog about this, but giving these guys additional minutes of fame? I don't think it's necessary. But, after giving William Hung way more than his 15 minutes, should I really expect anything else?

D'oh!

We've been having a problem with one of our cars for a little while now. Nothing serious, just an annoying light (BRAKE!) that pops on and stays on about every other time the car is driven. So, yes. Not a big problem (we hoped) but still slightly worrisome. Also, the car's manual says that you need to have the car checked right away if this happens.

We had this problem once before when we were driving through a nasty storm and our car was hit by lightning (that was a fun experience), and the light came on and stayed on. Since we knew the cause we weren't too worried about the problem, and it was fixed by some guy at the shop resetting some switch and sending us on our merry way.

This time we didn't know the cause, and as the light started coming on with greater frequency, we started to worry that maybe there really was something wrong with the brakes. This is the car that I had the major front end collision in, so we're always a little worried that it's going to fall apart on us.

Anyway, (I've dragged this on for much longer than the story is interesting; sorry) Aaron finally got worried enough to take the car into the shop this morning. He got there, they topped off the brake fluid, and sent him on his merry way. This was incredibly embarrassing for him, a car guy who couldn't figure out what was wrong when he looked. Glad we spent that money!

Wrong. Just, Wrong.

Yesterday at work I had to call a woman who works at a nursing home. I called said nursing home to reach her, and the receptionist put me on hold while the woman I needed to talk to was being paged. At first I wasn't really paying attention to the ads that were being played in place of hold music, but then one caught my ear:

"Our cremation services are friendly and affordable!"

Really? What if I were a person who was calling the home because my loved one was on their deathbed? What if my loved one had already died? While I was mostly shocked and amused, someone else could have been offended or gotten really upset.

Maybe they should reconsider who they sell ad space to. I mean, I know that death is an inevitability, and the likelihood that people in the nursing home will die before me is high, but do I really need to think about that while I'm on hold? Especially when it's an upbeat, happy ad, which promises me they'll take care of my loved one on the cheap?

I don't think so.
**************************************************************************
I have a choice to make, and since my husband's habits are rubbing off on me and I'm no longer quite as impulsive as I used to be, I'm doing some research on my choices. This is where you all come in. I need some opinions or information on your experience.

I want to get a new magazine (big decision, no? I'm so lame). I think I've narrowed my choices down to two: O Magazine (Oprah's magazine) or Real Simple. So, do you read either of these two on a regular basis? Which do you think will be more useful and entertaining? I thought about getting Martha Stewart Living, but decided against it for two reasons; 1) been there, done that; and 2) already get Everyday Food, and so I don't want all my periodical reading to be of the Martha Stewart persuasion.

So what do you think? Which of those two should I choose? Or am I totally missing the boat on some other great magazine?

(I should also mention that I just ended subscriptions to Cosmo, Gourmet, and Cooking Light, so I'm not interested in any of those.)

Healthy Food Obsession: Thwarted

Last night I was exhausted when I got home. I had only slept about 3 hours the night before, had a crazy busy day at work, and then hit the gym for 30+ minutes on the elliptical. Suffice it to say, I was not in the mood to cook dinner last night.

Usually when I'm like that, Aaron will throw together some sandwiches or something. Last night apparently he didn't want to throw together some sandwiches or something, so when he went into the kitchen to grab something for us to eat, he came back with a giant bowl of Cheetos for us to share (you would think he'd remember how dangerous that is when my mood is sub-par, but apparently he didn't). Then, since Cheetos were not enough of a dinner to fill me up, I had a small scoop of ice cream and a giant chocolate chip cookie to round out my less-than-square meal. Aaron opted for a different dessert: three rolls of Life Savers. That's right. THREE ROLLS of Life Savers. It was one of those days when he lived up to my nickname for him: The Candy Monster.

After reading that you probably wouldn't believe me when I tell you that we've been working hard at eating healthy, including lots of fresh fruits and vegetables. Maybe tonight will be better.

Well, Shoot

No surprises over here. Still crazy busy. Also, freezing cold. The high temperature here today is in the teens. Perfect weather for staying inside.

Yesterday when Aaron got to work, he only got in ten minutes before the power shut off. They had big ice storms in the town where his office is located and there are thousands without power. I can't imagine having no power to run my furnace in this weather; I'm sure there are a lot of cold people down there.

Anyway, since there was still no power at noon yesterday, and since the office was getting too cold to work in, he was sent home for the rest of the day. We had a lovely afternoon; we went grocery shopping and then Aaron played his new favorite computer game while I baked chocolate chip cookies and deep dish pizza from scratch. Then we settled in to eat all the amazing food (I'm truly loving my new/borrowed America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook) and watch our Monday night shows.

Aaron had to call in this morning to see if the power was still off, because if it was he didn't have to go in today. It might sound horrible for me to say this, but I prayed, hoped, wished, and kept my fingers crossed that the power would still be off, just for his neighborhood which is all industry. He's beyond stressed out lately and he needs a nice long break. I was hoping he didn't have to wait for our vacation in March because things will ease up before then, but it looks like that's the case, because the power was back on when he called. I'll just have to find other ways to relax him, I guess.

On a completely unrelated note, I just got an email that they want me to pose for a picture for our annual report at work since I wrote one of the articles (copied and pasted from the work plan is more like it, but still, I put it together). This really sucks because this is my bloated, sure to get a pimple week. At least I have a brow waxing scheduled for tomorrow night. Thank goodness for that!

Thank Goodness for Snow Days

Do you want to know what I love? I love three day weekends. Especially those when your extra day falls on a day when there's horrible weather (freezing rain, snow, sleet, ice) outside. It's the perfect day to stay inside and cook a warm and satisfying dinner (still have to figure out what to cook), and also to do laundry since I'm a lazy slob and have an overflowing hamper that I should have addressed on Saturday.

No worries though. I'm up early and have plenty of time to kill.

So anyway, the costume party on Friday night was a lot of fun. I love hanging out with these friends because they make me laugh incredibly hard. I wasn't drinking because I've been feeling under the weather, but even without alcohol (which is usually the case anyway because every party has beer and nothing else and I can't drink beer) it was a blast.

Here's Aaron as Dave Grohl:


His was my favorite costume of the night, but I may be a little biased. One (very drunk) guy at the party walked up to him, and the following conversation (that totally cracked me up) occurred:

Drunk Guy: Hey, you look like that guy!
Aaron as Dave Grohl: Um, Dave Grohl?
DG: No, the guy from Foo Fighters. The lead guy....Dave something?
AaDG: Dave Grohl?
DG: Yeah! Dave Grohl!
AaDG: Well, good. Because that's who I'm dressed up to look like.
DG: I like Kurt Cobain better.
AaDG: Um, okay then.

Anyway, here's me as Rebecca Howe (Kirstie Alley's character from Cheers):

My favorite part was that the shoulder pads weren't high enough for my liking, so I pinned "falsies" to the shoulders to make them even higher. When I sat down? It looked like my shoulders were trying to swallow my head. It was awesome.

At least we dressed up, because there were plenty of people who didn't, which was disappointing. We didn't get a picture of my favorite costume, which was the hostess dressed up as Jon Benet Ramsey. She looked a lot like her. The other best costume was actually horrible. It was a guy dressed up as John Wayne Bobbit, but I won't post pictures because they are incredibly inappropriate. He kept freaking people out with his costume, which is part of what made the party a laugh riot.

I'm glad we headed out, no matter how crappy I felt, because that's about the only thing we did all weekend. The big news, though, is that we finally have snow! Like, multiple inches. Of course it's covering about an inch of ice so it's a little dangerous to go out and enjoy the snow, but hey. It's here. Our likelihood of making it out to go cross country skiing just increased by a bunch, which makes me incredibly happy.

Of Course

Of course I'm coming down with a cold right before the first party we've been invited to on quite some time. I have a sore throat, a ton of sinus pressure and just generally feel like crap. I'm going to soldier on though. I have to. I bought a costume.

It has been decided that I will go as Kirstie Alley's Cheers character Rebecca Howe.

She always seemed like she was dressed a little too pretentiously for the bar, so I bought a long black skirt, black pumps and a purple suit jacket (with huge shoulder pads) from a thrift store last night. I'll also be wearing my pearls, being thankful I'm in need of an eyebrow waxing because they currently fit this character, and wearing purple blush in a line below my cheekbones. I also have to figure out what to do with my hair because it's significantly shorter, but I think I can pull something together.

Despite being sick and feeling crappy, I'm super excited about going out tonight. We've been trying to be less hermit-like and make new friends, and this party is at the house of some new-ish friends. It should be a blast, and I'm taking my camera so I'll have lots of fun shots to share. I just can't believe we're actually leaving the house on a Friday night. That never happens.

Panic

I woke up this morning in my least favorite way: in a panic. We're having a going away party today for one of my co-workers (my favorite co-worker to be exact; I'm very sad), and I woke up thinking I forgot to invite one very important other co-worker. In the end it just so happens that I did remember to invite her, so the panic was unwarranted, but I did forget to invite someone else I should have invited. People should not put me in charge of things like this when I'm really busy with other things. The end result is not as good as it should be.

It's been a really busy week and I'm happy it's almost over. I have a lot of things to attend to this weekend, including the absolutely huge pile of laundry in my hamper and taking down the Christmas tree; something that should have been done a couple of weeks ago. I'm still catching up from the Holidays and it's still driving me nuts. This was my first full week back at work and so I'm finally feeling a little more in the swing of things. Then they go and throw another 3-day weekend in the mix and I'm going to get all thrown off again.

Not that I'm complaining about the 3-day weekend, because I'm not. I love 3-day weekends, and wish I had more of them. I'm spending my extra day off (MLK, Jr. Day on Monday) visiting my sister for her birthday. I'm planning on taking her out to lunch and then having her show me around her sorority house and maybe hang watch a movie or something. I'd like to be home before dark because I don't like driving on the freeway, and have a hard time driving at night. Two things that I think lead to my giant panic attack last year when I went to visit her on her birthday. So I'm a little nervous about that too. I need to not think about it and maybe I'll be fine. Really what I need is to spend the weekend chilling out so that I'm not such a huge exposed ball of nerves.

Florida Dreamin'

First things first, you can still post on the last two posts; either by delurking on this one or by helping me with a costume idea (help! I need help!) on this one.

Over the past few days Aaron and I have been discussing when we're going to take our trip to Florida to see his parents. Scheduling this trip is tricky for several reasons, including:

1) We can't go in April, because Aaron's brother and his wife are having a baby in April and so his parents will most likely be here.
2) I'm taking an online class for work that goes from February 12th to the end of March. We don't know how much work this will require me to do (probably an hour or two per day), so we don't know how it will affect our travel plans.
3) We'd like to go sooner rather than later.
4) I have a business trip at the end of this month which falls right in the time Aaron originally wanted to go.
5) We can't go in the second half of March because one of my coworkers goes on maternity leave then and so it will just be too busy to go away at that time.
6) We're flying with an airline that only flies on Mondays and Fridays and has 3 fares, $69, $99, and $139 (each way), and Aaron wants to avoid the more expensive fare, so our travel days are limited that way.

Do you think we could make this any more difficult on ourselves?

Anyway, we're trying to figure it out because we really want to get down there. Throw in the fact that winter really has arrived (snowy and really freaking cold here right now) and then the fact that I found out one of my very best friends from college lives about 20 minutes away from my in-law's house and wants to take us partying in Miami while we're there, and I'm about to run down to Florida if I have to, just to get there as soon as possible.

Yeah, I'm slightly excited. And did I mention I've never been to Florida before? Because I haven't. And now I have to go about once a year. I already love my in-laws and now I have even more reason to want to go visit them.

I am really just too excited.

Until I think about all the gym and diet time I'm going to have to put in between now and then. At least I have new motivation to get my butt to the gym and not eat bad-for-me food (like the delicious macaroni and cheese I had last night, which truly was about the most delicious macaroni and cheese I've ever had).

But still. Excited!

Two Things Tuesday

First, if you haven't delurked yet, feel free to do so on yesterday's post.

Secondly, I need some help from you all. I have a birthday/costume party to go to this weekend and I need help figuring out what to go as. You see I have to dress up as a famous Dave, Becki, John, or Kurt (or any variation of one of these names, i.e. David, Rebecca, Jonathan, Jean, Johann, etc.), and I have no idea what to do.

("No more with the sneaky wet willie attacks.

I have thwarted your evil plans!")

My lovely husband (pictured above, just because I had to share this photo) is going as Dave Grohl (and will most likely be getting lucky that night because my number one rockstar crush is on Dave Grohl - TMI? Sorry!). We're spraying his hair black, shaving his beard down, and he'll be wearing his "Rock" shirt, his guitar hero guitar, and talking about how much he likes to effing scream and how he ate some food that gave him intestinal problems last night. It will be awesome.

The only idea I have so far is to go as Kurt Cobain, so we're kind of a pair. For this costume I would have to wear flannel, a longjohn shirt, and torn jeans, but also dye my hair blonde, which I'm not sure I want to do.

(Or, I just realized, I could try to find a blonde wig. that would probably be a little less drastic, huh?)

Then I would have to make sure said blonde hair is in my face all night. It would be a good excuse to buy a new pair of Chucks though.

So, yes. Can you think of a better idea of someone I could go as? I'm getting desperate as the party is only a few days away and other people have way better ideas than I do.

Oooh, I just thought of another idea. I could wear the same kind of clothes, but make my hair into a mullet (just pin back the sides and top somehow) and be Kurt Russell. There has to be someone more obscure though. And also, am I the only one who pictures Patrick Swazye when I'm trying to conjure up a mental picture of Kurt Russell? Must be a similar mullet issue.

Delurk: Just Do It

Hey! Guess what! Not that you haven't seen this everywhere else already, but: It's Delurking Week! (And I totally overused exclamation points for this paragraph!)

So, yes. Delurk! I know there are at least a few of you out there that visit daily and don't comment. I'm a compulsive stat-checker some days, so I see you out there not commenting and stuff. In an effort to make commenting on this post more fun, why don't you delurk with this info (but only if you want to):

1. What's your favorite color? (me: obnoxiously, it's pink)

2. Leggings: yay or nay? (me: nay. Also on the nay list? Leg warmers, which I totally saw someone wearing this weekend.

3. What is your favorite, good, but oh-so-bad for you snack food? (me: cheetoes and coke all the way baby!)

Winter Starts

Well, the work onslaught continues, and most likely will for the rest of the month, but I'm okay with that. There's not much else to do around here in January, so it's cool.

In other, fairly exciting, news, winter has finally decided to grace us with its presence. The weather outside, it is crappy and makes me want to stay in bed under mounds of blankets to counteract the mounds of snow that are outside. We love it though, and a common saying around here is, "If it's going to be cold, then it should at least snow." Which is exactly what happened: it got cold yesterday morning (finally!) and then it started snowing yesterday evening, and hasn't stopped since.

But anyway, I'm here at work at 7:30 for a reason (and not just because we had to take my car to the shop at 7). Did anyone else finally get winter this weekend?

!!!

12 hours worth of work to do today + 8 hours in which to do it =

No blog post today

This month is going to be hellish.

Bad Ideas

Bad Idea #1: Doing a new aerobics class after not having been to the gym in over a week and only going once per week in the two weeks before that.

Bad Idea #2: Deciding to go with a weighted bar that's a higher weight than the one you normally use for the lifting/squating portion of said class.

Bad Idea #3: Doing all of this the night after you didn't really sleep anyway.

Bad Idea #4: Eat a big, heartburn-inducing meal right after said class.

Bad Idea #5: Go to bed early, because laying down helps with the heartburn thing, right?

To say that I'm not feeling 100% today would be an understatement. Good thing I have loads of work to do on top of two parties (one baby shower mid-day and one going away party tonight). I might be dead by tomorrow. Also, I'm never going that long without going to the gym again. I could definitely feel how out of shape I got in just those few weeks.

Revisiting the Past (few entries)

Well, I'm back at work after a 4-day weekend and a sleepless night. We'll see how that whole "work harder at work" resolution goes. I'm hoping well, but I'm not holding my breath.

I didn't get the afghan done in time for my co-worker's baby shower tomorrow. I kind of bummed that I didn't get it done, but also kind of relieved because there's this one wonky corner of the blanket that looks really bad, and I think I'm just going to have to call this one a practice blanket and give it to any future daughters I may have to use for their dolls.

This past weekend I made ice cream using the ice cream maker I got as a Christmas present from my parents. Or, should I say, I attempted to make ice cream. It kind of turned out, but I had the mixture too cold when I put it in the machine so it froze too fast, and we're not fans of the recipe I tried. One of our favorite desserts is banoffee pie, which is a really, truly delicious recipe. We bought an ice cream cookbook last weekend, and one of the reasons we chose this cookbook was because it had a recipe for banana toffee (or banoffee) ice cream in it, and as soon as we saw it, we were sold. Maybe we should have tried something else first, because the recipe created ice cream that is just way too banana-y to eat. I'm going to try a different recipe (vanilla honey) this weekend. I really hope this one goes better.

I was much less forgetful over this past weekend, however, that could just be because I infrequently had my rear off the couch. Well, no, I take that back. I was much less forgetful over the past day or so.

On Saturday morning I decided to try a recipe for German Pancakes I saw over at Deb's site, and totally messed it up at first. You see, there's 2/3 cup of milk in that recipe, which I forgot to add. I made the batter, sans the milk, and poured it into the pans, and then luckily I glanced back at the recipe. I then poured the batter back into the blender, mixed in the milk, and repoured it into the pans. They turned out wonderfully, were completely delicious, and Aaron told me I could make them every day if I wanted to. Also, looking back at the forgetfulness entry, I realize that we forgot about the salad I made again, when we could have eaten it all weekend long. I'm fairly disappointed that we just wasted about $5 in produce. Way to go us!

Resolved

I usually don't make New Year's Resolutions, or at least not "officially". This year Aaron and I decided that we should go ahead and try the Resolution thing, so we've made quite a few. Here are mine with a couple of our joint ones added in too:

1. Floss more often (like, you know once a month would be an improvement), preferably once every couple of days.

2. Eat less fast food. I'm usually pretty good about this, but I've been bad about it lately.

3. Work out at least three times a week, including some kind of crunches at least three times a week.

4. Stay on a budget so that we can seriously increase our savings (which may or may not, depending on the housing market, be used to buy a house this summer).

5. Be more conscientious at work. I tend to slack, which is not good. Maybe if I step it up I'll get that promotion more quickly.

6. Along the same lines, quit procrastinating all the time. I seriously procrastinate all the time. I'm doing it right now; I'm supposed to be taking the car in for some repairs before noon. Who wants to bet I go in at 11? I'm hoping to be there around ten, which means I need to finish up this post and get my butt in gear.

7. Eat more vegetables and drink more water. I always feel better when I do these two things, so you think I'd do it more. Now I'm going to try to do just that.

8. Finish up all my started but unfinished projects. There are a lot of them, including 3 cross-stitch projects, 2 quilts, and 2 afghans. There may be more, but those are all the things I can think of right now. I'm going to be busy for a while!

9. Be better at keeping house. Not that my house is dirty, or anything, but there are times I leave too much clutter sitting around, or go three weeks without mopping my kitchen floor. I need to not let that happen. I even have a cleaning schedule I set up for myself and it would be much quicker to clean if I just followed it instead of leaving the tasks to build up so they take a few hours out of my weekend.

9.5. Use more environmentally friendly cleaning products. I've been wanting to try out Method products for a while. This year, I'm going to do it.

10. Not chicken out on the whole getting pregnant thing this year. We've put it off quite a few times, but look out April, here we come. We're not putting it off this time.

So, those are my resolutions for this year (which will soon be taped to my refrigerator as a constant reminder); what are yours?